Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton elaborates on her “mistake” remarks on former First Lady Nancy Reagan’s AIDS history.

Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton made headlines this weekend after praising late former First Lady Nancy Reagan for starting “a national conversation” on HIV/AIDS. That response was met with instant backlash from various LGBTQ organizations, including her political endorser the Human Rights Campaign, which found Clinton’s remarks inaccurate. Chad Griffin, HRC president, reminded supporters on Twitter that Reagan “was, sadly, no hero in the fight against HIV/AIDS.” Shortly after, Clinton issued a brief statement on how she “misspoke,” citing the Reagans’ work on stem-cell research, but not AIDS advocacy. She would later release a long post on Medium, saying “to be clear, the Reagans did not start a national conversation about HIV and AIDS. That distinction belongs to generations of brave lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people, along with straight allies, who started not just a conversation but a movement that continues to this day.” Read more »

A federal judge on Tuesday ruled that a trio of such athletes are not — as they contended in a lawsuit — ”employees” of the university, and thus not subject to federal labor laws guaranteeing a minimum wage for their work.

“The Supreme Court has recognized that there exists in this country a ‘revered tradition of amateurism in college sports,’ a fact that cannot reasonably be disputed,” Judge William T. Lawrence wrote in dismissing the case. (See the full ruling below.) “So, too, is the fact that generations of Penn students have vied for the opportunity to be part of that revered tradition with no thought of any compensation.”

The ruling comes as the issue of athlete rights — and compensation — hits the front burner in Philadelphia. Drexel University announced this month it will host a summit on the issue just as the NCAA basketball tournament is reaching its “March Madness” heights next month. Read more »

As the NCAA’s three-week run of March Madness begins, it’s time to talk about basketball student-athlete … academic fraud?

Syracuse University has not been included in this year’s NCAA tournament. Several weeks ago, the basketball program self-imposed a postseason ban on this year’s team — to which the NCAA then added sanctions and the vacating of 108 wins under head coach Jim Boeheim.

Boeheim countered with a press conference Thursday morning, just hours before the official first round of the tournament would begin, claiming his innocence and his intention to appeal sanctions that he claims are “unduly harsh.” Read more »

La Salle took advantage of a depleted VCU squad, and upset the Rams on the road in double overtime. Jordan Price led the Explorers with 36 points, including all of the Explorers’ 12 points in the second OT.

The NCAA, the organization that’s normally as inflexible as a PVC pipe, gave it up last week.

So what if part of the settlement of a filed court case was that it didn’t do anything wrong. Smart people know what was at work here: that even with the wrongdoing at Penn State, this NCAA revealed itself as a lying, cheating, and oft-incompetent organization infatuated with a beer-muscle bully pulpit. And they did it all under the guise of “protecting” college athletics. In many ways, it is the married preacher who teaches you the wonders of God, but after the sermon sneaks behind the altar to bang the church secretary.

So the Penn State football program got its 112 wins restored (taken away in the original “consent” decree), while Joe Paterno got re-credited with his 111, to become once again the all-time winningest college football coach, and the $60 million fine on PSU was fine-tuned to help child abuse programs only within the state of Pennsylvania.

Penn State nation celebrated this development, which I found somewhat peculiar. Joe Paterno may have been wronged in the manner with which he was fired as football coach, and his character may have been besmirched. But I think we go too far when we make Paterno a victim. This was a dark chapter of Penn State’s history that isn’t going to be wiped away by smearing the campus with Paterno’s total win number of 409. When we do that, we cheat the kids who were the true victims of Jerry Sandusky’s heinous child abuse.

Joe Paterno is once again the winningest coach in major college football history.

In the wake of the Jerry Sandusky child sexual abuse scandal, the late Penn State coach had 111 wins vacated in 2012. But Pennsylvania officials and the NCAA reached a proposed settlement that will restore Paterno’s wins, bringing his record to 409-136-3 — and 24-12-1 in bowl games. (A 112th win, which was won under interim head coach Tom Bradley following Paterno’s firing in the wake of the scandal, was also restored.)

Penn State and NCAA are in talks to reconsider the sanctions imposed after the Jerry Sandusky scandal, according to multiple reports — a reversal that could restore former coach Joe Paterno’s vacated wins back tot the record books.

Nobody’s talking about it. ESPN.com had the latter item on its home page Wednesday for a little while. By night fall, the item had been moved to the NCAA football page, and buried down the list of items; even below the blockbuster scoop that the University of Michigan president apologized to his lousy football coach for making harsh statements about his team being loaded with lousy students.

Here’s what most people are comfortable in believing: Penn State was a pompous institution that deserved to be sawed off by the NCAA because its glorious football program was harboring and protecting a valuable assistant coach who just happened to be a predator, all for the sake of winning football games.

The Centre Daily Times today reports that some Penn State trustees want the university to challenge the consent decree it signed with the NCAA, accepting guilt and punishment in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky scandal.

Those trustees say that NCAA emails — revealed in the ongoing lawsuit over whether the $60 million fine levied in the case will stay in Pennsylvania — show that the organization “bullied” Penn State into accepting the decree.

Tuesday night during Game 1 of the World Series, Chevrolet debuted a commercial featuring Philadelphia’s Mo’ne Davis, star of the Little League World Series and all-around general cool person who seems to be handling this burst of fame incredibly well. It’s heavy on Philly, including shots of Anderson Yards, Lazaros Pizza (I go there sometimes!) and the skyline. Oh, yeah, and it’s directed by Spike Lee.